I'm sure there are people in quite a few countries who would argue otherwise - like, for example, the entire population of Nicarauga.

Incidentally, Syria cooperated deeply with the United States in post-9/11 operations to capture members of Al-Qaeda outside of Afghanistan - the majority of Al-Qaeda sleeper agents captured in the West were nabbed on Syrian intel. And Hezbollah and Hamas may be nasty pieces of work, but neither has ever operated on American soil.

Even if America HAS supported terrorists in the past, I think we can all agree that it is wrong. Really, this is a separate issue- you have to support doing the right thing, even if we have been involved in the WRONG thing in the past. To claim otherwise is simply a way to put off responsibility.

As far as Syria goes- they may have helped us with Al Quaida then, but those efforts sure have petered out. And personally, I don't care if Hezbollah or Hamas have ever commited acts of terrorism on our soil. They murder civilians. They HAVE murdered Americans abroad. If given a chance, they sure as hell would attack us here at home. I would prefer not give them a chance. So they are murdering people OUTSIDE of the United States. It is still evil and wrong. It is also within our power to do something about it. If you see a bum getting his ass kicked on the street, even if it is not in your neighborhood, you have to do something, or you are complicit in that act. Call the cops, help the guy- something. Fighting terrorism IS within our power. And if the nations that support it have to get toppled in the process, I am in favor of that too.

This IS changing the world for the better. Wiping out terrorism IS a noble cause. I am surprised that more people are not thinking along these lines. We are the most powerful nation in the world. How can we not HELP but try and make this would a better place, in any way we can?

As far as Syria goes- they may have helped us with Al Quaida then, but those efforts sure have petered out.

Strangely, their efforts to lock down Al-Qaeda have petered out at exactly the same rate as the United States has concentrated its interests on this other, totally unrelated country. Can't remember the name of it right now.

And personally, I don't care if Hezbollah or Hamas have ever commited acts of terrorism on our soil. They murder civilians. They HAVE murdered Americans abroad.

American soldiers that were acting as an occupying force. It's an important distinction.

If given a chance, they sure as hell would attack us here at home.

That's exceptionally unlikely, given that both Hezbollah and Hamas exist solely on the basis to end Israel's occupation of the West Bank - Hamas in particular has issued communiques stating it will never attack the United States, as the USA is irrelevant in their eyes to the issue. You might as well start worrying about the IRA or the Basque Liberation Front attacking you.

I would prefer not give them a chance.

This is simply the root of the problem, and the root of all oposition to the US' military effort. Pre-emptive action is directly antithetical to the idea of a justice system, because justice is founded on the principle of presumed innocence. It's why "Saddam is bad" simply isn't good enough reason for most of the world, and why everybody is waiting for evidence of the WMDs that were the basis for the entire invasion and which are curiously being ignored now.

Wiping out terrorism IS a noble cause.

Yes, it is. Invading countries you don't like isn't going to get rid of it. Quite the opposite, really.

Pool-Boy, we are the most powerful country in the world. But all we're doing with that power is trying to bludgeon our problems to death. There's got to be a better way. Especially when you know that the post-war situation is going to be an even bigger mess than what you have now.

-Jag

From the mouth of my uncle Jim, the Republican banker:"I regret voting for Bush.""We need to vote him out of office."

I agree with godking's statement about Syria's "lack" of help in the war on terrorism. I heard a great quote about the US current foreign policy....they lost their keys in the garage, but are looking for them in the kitchen because the light is better.

Firstly, for Pool-Boy from AP today: "Other U.S. officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Syria had been helpful quietly in the war against the al-Qaida terror network and there was no evidence that help was abating." click here (story.news.yahoo.com)

The bigger problem with going in for the cause of right in any country we see fit is that we demand that the world respect our sovereignty within our borders to act as we feel is appropriate. And inherent in this demand is the concept of reciprocity. To use the analogy, the problem is not that we're seeing someone beaten on the street. Instead we're living in the global apartment building and we hear something that might be the sounds of someone having a domestic dispute in the apartment 4 doors down. Now if you're big enough you might be able to go in and kick the door open and even shoot the guy whose doing it right in the face. And maybe that first time people will say "bully for you, stopping that problem." But slowly you start kicking in more and more doors and shooting people in the face for less explainable reasons. And at some point no one cares what's going on in those apartments, they're just really tired of you kicking in everyone's doors, especially since no one really ever asked you to start doing that in the first place.

(edited by spf2119 on 16.4.03 0033)"It is well that war is so terrible, lest we grow too fond of it." - Robert E. Lee

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Originally posted by Pool-BoyThis IS changing the world for the better. Wiping out terrorism IS a noble cause. I am surprised that more people are not thinking along these lines. We are the most powerful nation in the world. How can we not HELP but try and make this would a better place, in any way we can?

Because we're not the police. If you go charging up to some guy you see comitting a crime on someone else's property and kill him, you're going to get charged with manslaughter at the very least. That's because it isn't your job to enforce the law.

What we're doing right now is called "vigilantism". And the "ends justify the means" sort of mindset that breeds it is a scary, scary thing, especially when you're talking about people's lives.

There are certain ways you act in civilized society. They may not be acting civilized by performing acts of terrorism, but sinking down to their level removes any sort of claim to a moral high ground we might have and turns what we're doing into plain old vengeance with a hefty side order of greed.

If not war, then what? I can understand a pro-peace stance. But I believe that war, in this case, is the answer. You can take you own "moral high groud" and claim that bludgeoning our problems is not the answer, then what is? Our years of doing nothing, and "negotiating" do nothing but make the problem worse. Present a better solution.

So an American citizen in Isreal, murdered by terrorists, not by mistake, rather, targeted SPECIFICALLY because they were American, is an example of an American Soldier unlawfully occupying?

If Syria is indeed cooperating, and just doing so quietly to save face- then great. Fantastic! Let's not invade. But we still should pressure them about their other terrorist ties as well. The situation is Isreal is simply not going to come to a peaceful resolution until the murder STOPS.

The whole "innocent until proven guilty" theory is completely irrelavant to this situation. That is a legal ideaology that is only applicable in the American Court of Law. This is NOT a law that applied to every aspect of life. Besides, even if it did, these terrorist groups ADMIT TO, and claim responsibility for, the acts they commit. And if the nations which support them don't do squat to bring them to justice, the situation has gone beyond the legal realm.

The post war situation may be a bigger mess in the short-term, but in the long term- routing out terrorism is better for the world. It is the right thing to do.

You can claim all of the grand moral concepts like "a civilized society does not behave like this," or "innocent until proven guilty," but this is a REAL world. Yes, we should strive to live towards these ideals, but sometimes that is just plain impossible in this real world. When cowards hide in shadows and murder innocent people, and when so-called soverign nations turn a blind eye- those ideals become impossible to abide by, You do your best, but you do what is right.

I am sorry- I just can't let a high-minded concept like "civilization" force us to turn a blind eye to suffering and death, whether or not is in OUR yard...

So an American citizen in Isreal, murdered by terrorists, not by mistake, rather, targeted SPECIFICALLY because they were American, is an example of an American Soldier unlawfully occupying?

I thought you were talking about Lebanon in 1983. As far as that case goes, while there have been a few deaths of American citizens in terrorist attacks in Israel, they weren't targeted because they were Americans. They were tageted because they unfortunately happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. You think the suicide bomber went around asking "excuse me, do you know where there might happen to be Americans around?"

That's exceptionally unlikely, given that both Hezbollah and Hamas exist solely on the basis to end Israel's occupation of the West Bank

Both Hamas and Hezbollah also function (quite well) as public service organizations - they run schools, hospitals, charities, etc. This is where most of their popular support comes from.

Hamas does not fight just to end Israel's occupation of the West Bank. [Here is the BBC website's profile of Hamas. An excerpt:

Hamas does not recognise the right of Israel to exist. Its long-term aim is to establish an Islamic state on land originally mandated as Palestine - most of which has been contained within Israel's borders since its creation in 1948.

While I don't think Hezbollah recognizes Israel's right to exist either, their purpose was to force Israeli withdrawal from South Lebanon, and end proxy control of the area by Lebanese Christians (Hezbollah is Shi'ite Muslim). They are not Palestinians nor are they active - or really have anything to do with - the West Bank/Gaza strip.

EDIT: That Hamas profile is actually part of a really good in-depth feature about the Israeli/Palestinian issue on the BBC's website. I highly encourage anyone interested in the issue to look through it. Click Here (news.bbc.co.uk)

Originally posted by Pool-BoyThis IS changing the world for the better. Wiping out terrorism IS a noble cause. I am surprised that more people are not thinking along these lines. We are the most powerful nation in the world. How can we not HELP but try and make this would a better place, in any way we can?

Because we're not the police. If you go charging up to some guy you see comitting a crime on someone else's property and kill him, you're going to get charged with manslaughter at the very least. That's because it isn't your job to enforce the law.

What we're doing right now is called "vigilantism". And the "ends justify the means" sort of mindset that breeds it is a scary, scary thing, especially when you're talking about people's lives.

There are certain ways you act in civilized society. They may not be acting civilized by performing acts of terrorism, but sinking down to their level removes any sort of claim to a moral high ground we might have and turns what we're doing into plain old vengeance with a hefty side order of greed.

I'll let them have the moral high ground in your mind, as long as no one crashes a plane into my house or kills my family with VX on a subway somewhere.

The problem is how much can we do? At some point even our resources are not infinite. Say we go in and take out the Syrian connection. Well then next week Bush comes on tv and says "we have reason to believe that Iran is harboring terrorists and funding terrorist networks" which is almost certainly the case to some degree. So we double back and begin to move into Tehran. At which point someone in the administration points out "you know, most of the folks involved in 9/11 were Saudi Arabian nationals and that country gives money to families of suicide bombers". So we use some of the bases we have in that country and turn Riyadh into a big parking lot. At which point our Israeli friends say "what about the terrorism that is the driving force behind so much of the conflict in this region?" which impels us into the Occupied Territories and most likely Lebanon just to make sure no one from Syria has slipped away into Beirut. And of course let's not forget that there are major Al-Qaeda movements all throughout Southeast Asia, and a very nasty rogue regime in North Korea who also espouses the idea of striking people before you can be struck. And oh yes, there's still Egypt, Libya, and a good deal of Sub-Saharan Africa that is fertile ground for hiding terrorists. Oops! I forgot Pakistan which keeps talking about stopping terrorism but encourages major incursions into India over Kashmir (which is just as localized an issue as the Palestinian conflict which you feel should be a grounds for US action). So I suppose if we could take over and hold say 30-35 more countries then we might be able to really root out the terrorists. Well except for those who are living in France or Germany or Russia. (no wisecracks from the peanut gallery!!)

The point is that at some point even the most powerful nation in the world benefits from the concept of civilization and the recognition that nations have certain rights. At some point our ability to use the giant hammer fist of death will not be sufficient to do everything we need to do in this attempt to keep our nation safe. And at some point people are going to say "why should we do anything to aid the United States if all they're going to do is just invade our lands, kill our people, topple our government, and make us their disciples?" Even if we have the will to run the entire world at gunpoint, I'm not sure we have enough guns to do so.

"It is well that war is so terrible, lest we grow too fond of it." - Robert E. Lee

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Originally posted by Pool-BoyYou can claim all of the grand moral concepts like "a civilized society does not behave like this," or "innocent until proven guilty," but this is a REAL world. Yes, we should strive to live towards these ideals, but sometimes that is just plain impossible in this real world. When cowards hide in shadows and murder innocent people, and when so-called soverign nations turn a blind eye- those ideals become impossible to abide by, You do your best, but you do what is right.

I am sorry- I just can't let a high-minded concept like "civilization" force us to turn a blind eye to suffering and death, whether or not is in OUR yard...

Yeah, because there's no other option... it's either go vigilante or close our eyes and hum. This sort of situation is exactly what the UN was supposed to exist for. If we'd supported it better over the years, it'd have been a hell of a lot more effective at doing its job and we wouldn't have to go all Punisher. And see... the problem with being a vigilante is, like spf said, when do you stop? After we crush the Middle East and Southeast Asia, there're tons of nasty folks in Central America and Africa... by then, we'll have a lot of ill will in Europe, and there're TONS of experienced terrorists in Ireland...

If they'd asked for our help? That'd be one thing. We're charging in on our own, and that's not a smart thing. People like to think they can solve their own problems.

(This is, of course, taking the position that the bullshit cover story of "doing the right thing" is the real reason we're over there. HAHAAAAHAHAHAHAAHA whew.)